(no subject)

[solitary_summer]

[Was there supposed to be a point to this post? Didn't think so.]

Reminiscences. About once a year, especially in times of stress when I need something comfortable and familiar to fall back upon, i regress to my musicals phase. Dig out my musical cds and wax all nostalgic. I've been having tunes from Elisabeth firmly stuck in my ear ever since I watched the dvd, popping up at the oddest moments. Like, when we were baking Weihnachtskekse, every time I was occupied with some purely mechanical task, bits kept surfacing - dip cookie in chocolate, lalala, alle tanzten mit dem Tod, doch niemand wie Elisabeth, dip cookie, lalala... and so on.

I kind of - not actually miss, but have a warm nostalgic feeling that comes close to missing, the unabashed emotional abandon, the fangirling, the queuing for standing room and student tickets, standing at the stage door to get autographs, being so familiar with a show that you notice slight changes, slips, different interpretations of first and second casts...

Elisabeth was also one of the instances where my seventh sense that usually tells me with moderate accuracy what I might or might not like was far, far off. Of course, I was rather indifferent to musicals then and the only things I knew about E. was the clip with Pia Douwes singing 'Ich gehör' nur mir' (oh my god was that still on Wurlitzer? I seem to remember so...), the whole Uwe Kröger hype, and, well, the E. hype in general. And as I've probably mentioned before, if something is over-hyped, I tend to react contrary out of principle, and am skeptic at least, and often dismiss it out of hand. In my mind, E. was kitsch, and that was that. Not interested.

It's good to be occasionally reminded that keeping a more open mind can be very worthwhile.

Then, a year or so later, I'd seen Kuss der Spinnenfrau twentysomething times and when it closed needed another musical to fangirl over, and something to take my mind off (but not too much!) The Crush, and since Grease was amusing, but bland, I tried E., and, surprise, surprise, liked it. A lot. My slight irritation with the latest additions and changes (specifically all those all goth wannabe Schwarzer Engel and Schwarze Möwe bits, ::shudder::) notwithstanding, I'd still be prepared to argue that it's a damn good musical, with some pure genius parts. 'Ich gehör nur mir' is very effective in context, and Maya's version never failed to send a shiver down my spine, but 'Nichts, nichts, gar nichts' is perfect. The sheer brutal sexiness of 'Die Schatten werden länger', and the way they used Death's androgyny in the Mayerling/Totentanz scene. If not before, that's when I fell for it. All of the ensemble scenes are wonderful. The resounding hush in the theatre after 'Hass', and the couple of times when a few people started to applaud, not, I assume, because of political sympathies, but out of an end-of-scene reflex, and were shushed. Fond memories... (I always turn this way down when I listen to the cd, unless it's on headphones, because I don't want people who don't know the context to overhear.)

So not kitsch.




I had framed posters signed by the whole cast from both KdS and E. The sad thing is (or is it?), if I had a larger apartment I still might hang up the KsS one.